Monday, January 26, 2009

America Knows No Journalism

I just received this forwarded e-mail from Phil Orenstein. A perfect example. America's pissant propaganda sources are so disturbed, so biased. I avoid them all:

Headlines On This Date 4 Years Ago:

"Republicans spending $42 million on inauguration while troops Die in unarmored Humvees""Bush extravagance exceeds any reason during tough economic times""Fat cats get their $42 million inauguration party, Ordinary Americans get the shaft"

8 comments:

Comparing Bush's 2nd party to Obama's first and quite dishonestly too. That's why it is forwarded in emails. The mainstream press has more honest than random internet spammers.

The $42 million cited for Bush, while roughly accurate, doesn't include the cost of security and other incidentals covered by federal and state governments.

Factoring in the rest of the expenditures, in 2005 federal and local governments were tapped for an additional $115 million to cover security, swearing-in, clean-up, and a paid holiday for federal workers on the day of the Bush inauguration. That adds up to a combined total of $157.8 million from both private and government sources.

Dear Anonymous: If you believe that the "mainstream press", by which I assume you mean the pissant propagandists, have covered Barack Obama in anything approximating the way that they have covered Republican candidates I wish you luck.

It's not a matter of belief for me. It is a matter of facts. They can editorialize however they want. Your chain emails are patently false as I showed. You believe what you now can check for youself to be false and unequal comparison. The emailer has an agenda that aligns with your agenda and facts be damned. Be honest that you accept dishonesty in the name of your agenda.

Now here is an anonymous commenter who does know how to copy and paste. However, even the Urban Legends site whence comes his info, including the fuzzy math, is forced to admit that

"G.W. Bush received more criticism — mainly from Congressional Democrats, but also from some members of the press — for the "extravagant" cost of his inauguration in 2005 than Barack Obama received for the cost of his in 2009."

The point is not made, it was evaded. You quote a subjective thing such as who got more criticism when I said I don't care who editorializes, mainstream press, email forwarders or bloggers. Hard facts like math show both inaugurations to be similar and call it fuzzy all you want, it is patently dishonest to leave out the largest expenditure from 1 and include it in another so a reader can't even judge it fuzzy or actually what is federally reported. Bloggers and email forwarders are flat out lying here while the mainstream press played up one true story and played down another true story but offered both to consumers.

A pro Obama poster on this blog argues that Barack Obama is ethical because he didn't spend more than George Bush on his frivolous inauguration. According to the "Common Dreams" website:

"Official statistics show that 12.7 percent (or 37 million) of the population in the U.S. lived in poverty in 2004, while 15.7 percent (45.8 million) lacked health-insurance coverage; 11.9 percent of households (comprising 38.2 million people, including 13.9 million children) experienced food insecurity."

In fact, the urban legends website from which anonymous poster seems to have derived his comment states:

"There's no final tally yet for the Obama inauguration, but given that at least five times as many people attended, security and clean-up costs were surely higher than for the 2005 event. Press estimates currently range around $150 million total, including both private and government expenditures."

Let's see. A hamburger and a glass of juice costs about $1.50. At $1.50, Mr. Obama could have purchased 100 million lunches. So with 13.9 million hungry school children, Mr. Obama could have ended hunger for more than a week. Instead, he chose to starve the children and spend it on a self-serving inauguration party.

Mr. Obama's starvation of children is an outrage. The media, including Fox News, lies and fails to hold the child-starving American president to account.

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Mitchell Langbert

About Me

I have researched and written about employee benefit issues and in my previous life was a corporate benefits administrator. I am currently associate professor of business at Brooklyn College. I hold a Ph.D. from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business, an MBA from UCLA and an AB from Sarah Lawrence College. I am working on a project involving public policy. I blog on academic and political topics.